A Place You Cannot Touch
by PurpleYin
Summary: People forget that Sherlock is high functioning, that he has restraint he exercises when he chooses to. They think in terms of what he does, what they think he does, not what he does not. John/Sherlock one-sided/UST.


Spoilers: Up to end of S1 only I think?

A/N: Betaread by exbex. Inspired by this vid http : / / www . youtube . com/watch?v=7S3acTQnHgY

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People, _most_ people, including some of those who are fairly well acquainted with him, think Sherlock Holmes swans around anywhere he wants. Yes, they all think he does exactly what he wants, when he wants to, goes anywhere he likes. Of course he doesn't in reality. There's all sorts of boring limitations to what is desired, ones he has, like any other human being, discovered long ago.

Consideration of money is key. So too is difficulty in getting places - he can drive, despite what the DVLA thinks (and it's likely Mycroft has edited their register on the sly some years ago to that effect) and he can travel by plane, tedious as sitting trapped in a glorified metal can with wings is. Taxi's are preferred though, private with fewer distractions, and trains, less boxed in and more room for movement than planes. Few doors stop him, but he finds the time has to be right for an entrance usually and there's more to gain usually by hiding in plain sight, sidling away all sorts of information for free if you but look, or forcing oneself on a person unexpectedly, an affront they react to in interesting tell-tale ways.

Truly there is nowhere he can't get if he puts his mind to it, but not everywhere appeals, very few places appeal actually. Anywhere could be entertaining and yet he finds himself waiting, waiting interminably for something special, a case that quirks the brow and ignites the spark. Anywhere could be, but more often than not a place is washed out, and it's in the details that colour sweeps in at the edges. It's in the clues he chases, he yearns for the journey because once you're there, bing, destination reached, what else is left? There is no calm reached, he can't get to the place he ought to go, which is exactly the kind of place others ordinarily flee. No rest for the wicked and few would disagree with the likeness of that he presents.

People think, he is sure, that Sherlock Holmes does whatever he wants. His hands pick up items, any item, things not his and play with them as he mulls murder, settling them back down again when he likes, with a flourish. They see that he is wilfully ignorant of private space and sense of property when it suits him – he finds it helpful to see that blush, hear that stutter, know that affect he has and know furthermore when it has changed, when the recipients mood or attitude has changed in regard to either him or to their own situation. Touching things is engaging, useful, sensory input. Touching people is informative too, people are merely another kind of thing in the world, and barely ever more, or even as, engaging as he has found inanimate things to be. A person he can, with few exceptions, read in seconds whereas a book takes longer and a book can teach him new things, new data, complex and in a format he can cross reference.

There is one thing, one person, Sherlock does not touch and does not hope to read completely with his gaze. A room to match, theirs, that he does not invade, though it is never locked. Sherlock is missing a lot of data there. If he were to do anything, to act on a desire to rectify this matter, to reach out and close the space he feels, he would need data. Since he doesn't have it, it forever stays in the domain of unknown and unwise to approach. The irony here is that people assume he has – approached, touched, possessed - and the subject themselves assumes a lock would be pointless, that Sherlock has had his way there.

Sherlock knows from this that several facets of John Watson are open to him, with meaning inherent, except he can never be sure which ones he needs to matter and whether those exist on both sides of the door. What to decipher from the casual exasperation at public assumption of more between them – reluctant acceptance of misguided perceptions or hidden disappointment at the inaccuracy? He cannot read John as he would wish to.

Sherlock _could_ easily walk into that room. As ever, it's not about the journey. What he fears, in a sickening alien realisation, is the destination. Other people chase after that, instead of peace. They chase after people and for the most part they want the person, at least briefly. Sherlock doesn't know what he'd do to get that, to keep that, to enjoy that. He only knows the chase and the epiphany that flares brightly before it fades into obscurity, superseded by another. Thrills in his experience have a tendency to be short-lived and John cannot be a holiday for his mind. He has his work and he has Dr John Watson, his blogger, trailing in his wake. He cannot double back and run to John, risk passing him by if he is wrong, because going backwards to a time before John makes the least sense.

People mock and curse Sherlock Holmes for knowing too much, for speaking without prompting and revealing what they seek to hide. He sweetens the scene with his dry humour and lack of tact, a display on his numbness and indifference as he cuts their safety ropes away from them. Let them think him inhuman, a machine.

That ploy was one proved countless times, until he, the man, was shown up by John Watson, poking at his humanity. Suddenly there was John who stuck through the danger, grinning back at him, stirring warmth into the body that should simply be transport and sparking curiosity Sherlock feels is a far worse danger than pills or bullets; a distraction, a diversion, instead of a pause or an end.

He, as the man so few sense, he stops himself from going that one place. Travelling everywhere else. If he had a ticket though, he knows what it would say, what it would show as his destination; the station he is forever watching as the carriage pulls on past again, heading out. The choice is go off the rails - crash out of bounds, out of range - or go where they eventually lead.

More and more he thinks to himself it could be much worse than to deposit him at the feet of a patient man with a dark side a mile wide and a not exactly legitimate sidearm he's willing to shoot people with on his behalf. Sherlock could be okay with that, as long as when he gets there the running would be over, but he reminds himself he can't be certain, insufficient data, and he stares a little longer at the slice of light coming from under the door.

Even oblivious to the Earth's orbit, he used to have a sense of direction, but now it all centres on this one untouchable focus point of John. There is momentum acting on his matter, without a clear vector. Not one he wants to admit anyway . Sherlock finally turns away, ready to retreat to the living room following the sparse seconds wasted spent standing still contemplating not-the-case. He'll go back to their shared near-public place where he can claim out of theirs enough to consume his and John's space both in a small victory against his base weaknesses. What is he fighting for and what is he fighting against? Without the requisite knowledge he can't tell if this is progress to have resisted or a reluctant defeat.


End file.
